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What happens when two of your social media friends get together? Well, this week Sum All, the social media dashboard and Buffer, the social media management tool, hooked up to share some salacious social data. By working together they were able to compare the the effectiveness of posting frequency. And they came up with some pretty interesting insights.

For those who are active on social media, the recommendations may come as a surprise. After all, it’s easy to schedule or post multiple updates to run WITHIN AN HOUR – not just across the course of a DAY. But it seems for the most part, that INFREQUENT posting may be the most effective route. For example:

Twitter: probably the noisiest of the lot, Twitter can explode on a particular topic. Just look at “today’s” fascination first with llamas and then later, with #TheDress. Research suggests that the level of engagement begins to decrease after only the THIRD tweet each day – and that means #TheDress flooded most people’s quotas

Facebook: there’s an ongoing debate over the Facebook newsfeed algorithms and the level of organic reach, but the research also indicates that two posts is the max point for “Likes” and comments

Blogging: perhaps the most interesting of the stats – is that doubling your blogging efforts from around once a week to twice a week doubles the number of inbound leads. And here we were thinking that blogging had died a quiet death

The big question is …

As with all research, there will always be outliers – and exceptions to the rule. But for those who actively manage brands on social media, how do you find this correlates with your experience? Have you tested for post frequency? What about time of day? Or “best day” for posting? My thinking and experience suggests:

B2C brands may need to post more frequently – especially where there is a customer experience / service angle

Brands that are in the early stages of growth will always take effort to establish a follower base. Activity can ease off as community activity begins to increase

Standard time of day posts still tend to work when your audience is receptive – during work breaks and in the evenings (note this can be challenging where your audience is comprised of shift workers)

Some channels work better on weekends. And yes, that can mean email too. Be sure to test all opportunities to engage.

You’ve probably met the type – or had them pitch you. They’re the FUD masters, sewing fear, uncertainty and doubt, knowing that at the end of the conversation they have a lead to follow up or maybe even a project. They talk big numbers, after all, 40% of the Australian population use Facebook, 3 million on Twitter and well, everyone in the country on Google. Surely you can’t afford NOT to have a presence in these digital territories.

In the world of small business, we’ve been hearing these pitches for years. These “Social Media Expert Gurus” (SMEGs) would sweep in, dazzle business owners, soak up budgets and then disappear when it came time to report back on results and outcomes. More recently, we are seeing larger enterprises follow this same course. Sometimes the entree comes through the Board or senior executives. They are swayed by the “social media savvy” and “digital swagger” of the SMEG and quickly find themselves signing up for hefty retainers attached to uncertain outcomes.

But the immediacy and impact of social media can be addictive. And even the most cynical executive can find themselves enthralled.

Every time someone reads, clicks or shares a link or piece of content that we have created, it sends a small dose of dopamine into our brain. This release provides us with a sense or reward, pleasure – and encouragement. It’s why (for the marketer) digital marketing or social media can be addictive. It is also why those who don’t use social media fail to understand the way that participation can become contagious – or how content can go “viral”.

Adobe have taken aim at this phenomena with their Mean Streets video. It’s a fantastic take on the rollercoaster of social media vanity metrics – Likes and Fans. Will it help you spot a SMEG in the crowd? Perhaps not, but you know who to call when you need to be bailed out.

From almost any angle, businesses are under pressure. Connected customers are out-flanking business efforts to control the flow of goods and services and manage relationships in an increasingly connected economy. The global economy continues to struggle under the weight of misguided policies, sovereign debt and an entitled corporatocracy that aims to “maximize the status quo” . As Seth Godin points out, this industrial focus on our economy has a limited future:

Today’s industrialists define our economy, but they offer very little promise for tomorrow. They’ve long bought ads to polish their image, but mostly work to alter the culture in ways that will ensure they’ll get just a little bit more yield out of each of us.

But as Mary Meeker’s 2012 recap on the state of the internet suggests, disruption is the new normal. And when it comes to digital, disruption comes in many colours.

Five Impacts of Digital Media
Writing on the invention of the printing press, Elizabeth Eisenstein suggested there were five impacts that transformed society of the time. In 2012, we too can see these impacts playing out in our personal and professional lives (and all the spaces in-between):

Experts coming under pressure from new voices who are early adopters of new technology

New organisations emerging to deal with the social, cultural and political changes

There is a struggle to revise the social and legal norms — especially in relation to intellectual property

The concepts of identity and community are transformed

New forms of language come into being

Educators are pressured to prepare their students for the newly emerging world

Nielsen Social Media Report 2012 signals the end to the industrial age of marketing

Showcasing each of these five impacts, the Nielsen Social Media Report for 2012 signals not only that “social media has come of age”, but that digital has truly arrived as a force that can no longer be ignored. Once, the staunchest defender of an analogue ratings system, Nielsen’s own transformation confirms that the industrial age of marketing is closing and that a new era has arrived.

Marketers are not only under pressure to respond to the mega trends outlined above – they must also address the five pillars of enterprise disruption which are playing havoc with business strategy and engagement tactics. These days marketers must consider:

A strategy of mobile only, not mobile first: Not only are mobile technologies different in form and shape. They are taking over our patterns of adoption and consumption. With mobile devices already outselling PCs in India and China, it is expected that this change will impact Australia, the US and Europe in 2014. With long lead times and a dearth of digital skills within organisations, marketers will need to move now to serve their connected consumers who prowl the digital landscape. And rather than thinking mobile first, marketers need to think mobile only

Social is mobile: Mobility is not only an issue for interruption – or even permission based marketing. It is an issue for social engagement platforms. App usage now accounts for more than a third of social networking time. There is still significant space for growth – and marketers will need to understand how this mobile+social dimension impacts the customer experience

Social TV is disrupting broadcast: While the focus is currently on Twitter as a social TV enablement platform, this is an area ripe for disruption. Just as publishers were slow to respond to digital and are now facing significant business model challenges, broadcast networks have also been slow to invest, experiment and learn from social technologies. This has opened the door to innovative startup who will continue to outpace the industrial age broadcasters

The buyer’s journey has changed forever: The marketing funnel as a concept is over 100 years old. In a digital world, its linear process is also a mark of the industrial marketing era. It’s time for marketers to re-cast the marketing funnel for consumer engagement.

Download the Nielsen report and let me know what you think. Will it change the way you plan and execute your marketing efforts in 2013?

Businesses are often advised that the first step in any social media program is to LISTEN. But who do you listen to? What do you listen for? And how do you do it? This infographic steps you through the process I follow. It should get you started. You can download this PDF from Slideshare, or get a copy of the image here.

There is one big difference between what I would consider “traditional marketing” and “social media marketing”. It’s love. Or perhaps more precisely, it’s passion. Mixed in with a bit of love. And as there are a bunch of posts on the love theme this Valentines Day week, I thought I’d climb aboard the love bus.

Now, if you are a brand marketer, you might love what you are doing, and love what you are creating through your brand, but that’s not the sort of love I am talking about. When you pour your professional creativity into a new product or service and stake your professional reputation on its success, your interest in the brand/offering you are building can consume you. And while this takes a huge personal commitment from you, there is no one else who will love what you are doing quite like you do. I know, and I’ve been there.

And even if you are tweeting from the dark side of the focus group mirror, or blogging on the behind-the-scenes tour, this is not being a “social marketer”. It’s sharing your passion. Sharing your love. Sharing your work. But ultimately, it’s sharing your brand. It is good brand marketing practice.

The social marketer, however, starts from a different place. As Michael Brenner suggests, it’s about feeling the love.

For the social marketer:

The brand is a means to an end. The brand exists, the people exist – we don’t need messaging, but a tune to dance to.

Marketing is about bringing the brand to the people, not bringing the people to the brand

The glare of the logo is a distraction and a barrier to forming relationships. What we need is a name and a face, not a 12pt white space exclusion

Sure, the social marketer cares about (and is probably even MEASURED on) brand awareness, recall and yes – sales. But they are by-products of the main game.

The social marketer is in the process of transforming the way that we all do business. You probably have one in the ranks of your company. There may be more. How do you find them? How do you join them?

Back in 2008, Joe Pulizzi started looking in-depth at blogs that focused on content marketing. He found 81 blogs – and the Junta 42 were the viewed as the leaders in what was then an emerging field.

Two years on and the field has exploded, with almost 400 blogs being tracked as part of the Junta 42 list. This growth mirrors not only the interest in content marketing and social media, but the general explosion in blogging as a method of communication.

Each of the blogs in the Junta42 are ranked based on a number of factors, explained as follows:

The number of posts in last quarter that pertained to a content marketing topic. Those posting on 3 or more days per week received the highest number of points.

Substantiveness of Posts. Here we worked to weed out posts that fell short of adding value to the collective body of knowledge about content marketing. For example, blogs that simply linked to other blogs or articles without adding new information, perspectives or ideas to the commentary received lower scores than did blogs that consistently delivered unique ideas, thoughtful insights, deep coverage, rich media and the like – you know, high-value content – to the community.

Google PageRank. (All blogs were checked on the same day.)

Previous Ranking.

The latest version of the Junta 42 provides a handy reference to some of the leading content marketing blogs – a very useful resource for those marketers working with social media as part of their strategy. The August 2010 top 42 content marketing blogs are:

I can remember hand coding my first “proper” website. It was for a small business that I was running out of an artists’ studio on a dilapidated pier. We specialised in helping publishers move from the print to the new web-ready world. Well, it was almost web-ready – it was the days when there was “an Internet” and a “World Wide Web” – and they were two different things. They were completely different experiences.

Being impatient and a risk taker, I bet my money on the graphical world wide web and created a website. It felt like I was working at the edge of the world – and in a way it was.

Fast forward to 2010 and it is a vastly different world. Knowledge of “the web” and how it works is far more widespread. Indeed, it has spread far beyond my own meagre expertise. There has been a massive transformation in the shape, technology and the platforms that enable our polyphonic internets – perhaps matched only by the huge shift in the way in which we use it. (And I do mean “use” in a very loose way.)

However, the way in which digital agencies are “briefed” has remained relatively static. Gareth Kay suggests that it is time that we changed our briefs – and has put together a great presentation, PostDigitalBriefs, that challenges us to do just that. But best of all, Gareth provides us with a way forward.

Take a good look through the presentation yourself, but my key takeouts are:

Know what we want people to do

Understand which behaviours we want to shift

Differentiate and articulate your social mission vs the commercial proposition

Identify the triggers that will prompt people to share

Make it easy for people to participate

Know where your constituents are and the social rules that operate there

What does it mean when we say that a brand “gets it”? I don’t necessarily mean in relation to social media – but in general? It means that we have reached an intuitive accord – that our values align. That there has been some form of exchange – I’ve been delighted unexpectedly by a purchase, surprised by the sales process, charmed by the account team.

In the world of advertising, we don’t see enough of this. It’s why the good work stands out so far. And while we should see more of it in social media, in reality it’s still rare. I think, in part, because we are still feeling our way – tentatively looking at the envelope rather than pushing it around.

But here’s something I like. It’s not necessarily social – but it tells the story of being social. Perhaps it’s the start of a story yet to unfold.

This ad (HT to Sean Howard), from Puma and Droga5 reminds us that sometimes, simply being social is the most challenging feat of athleticism many of us are likely to experience. Do we need special gear for that? It seems we do.

I can remember the smell of Old Spice from my youth. It reminds me of old men. Men much older than I am now. Or so it seemed. In reality, they were the young men of my parents’ lives. They were the dusky, active men of 70s – surfers, sailors, layabouts. They went water skiing in the summer and to the snow for winter. They drove real 4WD vehicles (for a reason), smoked way too much and drank VB. Or was it Tooheys New?

Whether this is accurate or not, it’s the brand image that is hard baked into my mind.

So it was going to take some effort to recast that brand association.

Now, I know that I am probably not in the target market for old spice body wash, nor even in the right geography, but it seems that the @OldSpice man campaign has been a great success. Take a look at the case study below for a neat summary. And if you want more detail, check out Jordan Stone’s post on the We Are Social blog.

But beyond the statistics, what can we learn from an old, sleeping dog like Old Spice? What can we see from the way that brand perception was able to shift through a coordinated, integrated trans-media storytelling point of view? What roles did broadcast, celebrity and social media play in amplifying and extending the brand interactions – and why were they potent? I’m going to think on this in relation to the P-L-A-Y framework for storytelling and get back to you.